This basic understanding of genetics that we went through, helps us to get to the point where we can talk about epigenetics. Epigenetics is this new, very important, very interesting, dynamic aspects of science and genetics that's currently being researched at a prolific amount right now. Basically, what epigenetics does is it explains how we can have all these different types of cells that have all the same genetic material, but they're actually able to look different, behave different, and start to be tagged in order to have changes and regulatory effects that are going to make them different proteins or use different genetic information. The definition of epigenetics is which means to stand upon your genes. So it's literally talking about little tiny molecules like methyl groups for the most part, that are either attached to the genes themselves or the histones. What they do is they regulate which part of your genes or genetic information is going to be translated. Of course, this is not just determined by DNA, epigenetics is the point where our environment and our behavior is actually going to collide with our genetic material and it's going to start to be changed over time because of what we do and what's been done to us. So epigenetics is going to be histones or the DNA that are gonna be tagged with things like phosphate groups, or methyl groups, or acetyl groups, but mostly, methyl groups, we really talk about nurture and environments role in tagging these genes. So again, you imagine that we have all this genetic material and in the course of our life, different genes are going to be tagged with methyl groups, and that those genes are going to be usually up regulated or in some cases, down regulated. If a gene is up regulated, it means our cells will make more of that specific protein. If a gene is down regulated, it will make less or none at all of that protein. All cells contain the same genes, but gene expression patterns are going to be different. These patterns, these methyl patterns actually can change from life events, they can change from diet, they can change from exercise, they can change from stress, they can change from trauma. Current scientific research continues to give us more and more information of how we can actually have these cells that start to differentiate and behave differently. This picture depicting how over time, all of our repetitive actions get ingrained in ourselves through epigenetics, tagging our genes and therefore changing how they are regulated and marked. So there's a whole bunch of new research coming out. The majority of research that has led us to this amazing information about epigenetics, has either been from historical events that have happened. So there's a very famous example of a study in Sweden that had to do with diet and then accumulated Tory effect of next generations on storage of fat. We have a lot of studies of mice. So there's an amazing article that's in the link to the class about mice, and stress, and fear. Really what's amazing about this, as we start to look through all of this research that's coming out is that not only does our environment, and our life, and our stress levels, and exercise, and everything we do every day in our lives start to have an impact, but that this impact can actually be passed down through two subsequent generations. So this idea that we had of nature versus nurture, which has proliferated in science for quite a long time, it's starting to blend. Because now what we're finding is this, what we used to think of as nurture, is actually inheritable as well. So what we're saying here is that bad epigenetic information and good epigenetic information can actually be passed. We have a lot of new information coming out about epigenetics and trauma, and epigenetics and certain behaviors and events that have happened. The good news is that your behavior doesn't just affect you, it actually does affect subsequent generations, but it's also changeable. So for example, if you commit to a healthy lifestyle now, and you start to actually change these epigenetic markers. You all know the feeling of creating new epigenetic changes, because you know what it feels like to have new patterns made. Whereas of course, if you decide to stick with an unhealthy lifestyle, these also are going to have an impact on your genes, and they are going to be tagged. So what happens is we actually become very different. If we look at identical twins studies for example, there's many studies that indicate that these behavioral changes and these environmental changes, have a huge impact in allowing you to become a different person. Likewise, it also explains why a lot of twin studies, when we had identical twins separated at birth, there were some similarities that were unexplainable because they actually had epigenetics that were passed through them from behavior. So preferences in separated twins is something that comes up a lot. So what all this means is that if we're constantly imprinting our genes on a molecular level based on impacts that our environment has, based on repetitive behaviors, based on what we eat, our stress levels. If we start to tag all of our genes for stress hormones because we're stressed all the time, epigenetics is going to start to up-regulate that. But because this is reversible, it gives us an amazing opportunity to start to integrate some of these practices we're learning in the yoga modules into some of our genes. So repetition of things like mindfulness, healthy lifestyle, and really starting to engage our bodies in a more healthy and integrated fashion, we actually can start changing our genes from an epigenetic perspective, and that's going to have an impact on subsequent generations, not just us. So what are some of the main mechanisms that epigenetic changes can have a big effect? So number one, it can have an effect on a molecular level. Because all of a sudden, we're going to be changing which parts of the book are read and how much are read. So things like cortisol, and adrenaline, and stress-related hormones, they're actually hopefully going to be decreased by slowly over time, these behaviors we do every day, are going to decrease the amount of stress hormones that we tend to stimulate. Likewise, it can help with immune function. If we start to have a healthier lifestyle, a healthier outlook, we're going to have a healthier reaction with our immune system. It's going to be more likely to be able to fight off diseases. Decreasing inflammation, managing chronic stress, managing chronic pain. So chronic stress, chronic pain, and over stimulation of the sympathetic nervous system, all work on these really impressionable feedback loops. So if we can start to implement new practices that down regulate these, those can have lasting effects on our physiological health, and these epigenetic markers can actually start to get our body's used to behaving, acting, and feeling completely different.
